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Biology, breeding, husbandry and diseases of the captive Egyptian fat-tailed jird (Pachyuromys duprasi natronensis)

Lab Animal volume 37, pages 256–261 (2008)Cite this article

Abstract

The fat-tailed jird, a small North African rodent with a distinctive club-shaped tail, is a convenient research subject and an emerging model for Old World leishmaniasis. The authors present the natural history and biology of the Egyptian fat-tailed jird and provide guidelines for the breeding and husbandry of this species on the basis of their experience raising a colony from wild stock in Cairo, Egypt. They also discuss the diseases they encountered in wild and captive-bred jirds.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Nivine Moawad and David Bentzel for their technical writing assistance. We also express our gratitude to the following NAMRU-3 Animal Resources Department personnel, past and present, who generously provided quality veterinary care to not only our FTJs but the rest of our housed animals: Animal Caretakers: Ibrahim Salem, Salah El-Sayed Ahmed and Mohamed Galal; Veterinary Technicians: Neil Domingo, Jimmy Howard, Willie Sifford, Rickey Claiborne, John Maguranis, Damien James, Aaron Boyles, Brett Long, Christopher Bell and Krista Spellum; and Veterinarians: Cornel Kittell, Stephen Tobias, Rebecca Holt, Mohamed Abdel Fattah and Fady Guirgiss. The opinions expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not reflect the official policy of the Department of Navy, Department of Defense or the US Government.

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  1. Stephen A. Felt

    Present address: Present Address: Stanford University, School of Medicine, Comparative Medicine Department, Veterinary Service Center, 287 Campus Drive, Stanford, CA 94305-5410.,

Authors and Affiliations

  1. US Naval Medical Research Unit No. 3, PSC 452-Box 5000, FPO, 09835-0007, AE

    Stephen A. Felt,  Hussein I. Hussein &  Ibrahim-Helmy Mohamed Helmy

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  1. Stephen A. Felt
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Correspondence to Stephen A. Felt.

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Felt, S., Hussein, H. & Mohamed Helmy, IH. Biology, breeding, husbandry and diseases of the captive Egyptian fat-tailed jird (Pachyuromys duprasi natronensis). Lab Anim 37, 256–261 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1038/laban0608-256

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